A real post this time....LOL

I wanted to give some plugs to a few of my TLOFA sisters which is long overdue! Sorry girls! :0) Of course I have blogged many times about my friend Chris of The Antique Pallet and her mad painting skills. I have more than a few of the things she has painted and I will treasure them always! Well, not only can the woman paint, but she also makes some beautiful bottlecap jewelry and keychains! She surprised me this last year with a handmade keychain that had a pic of each of my two kids on each side of the bottlecap. I was so touched! There I was crying in the parking lot at the post office-seriously! You should be able to click on the banner above and it will take you to her online shoppe.....

Another TLOFA sister, Pat of Ahl Cooped Up has a website!You should be able to click on the logo above and it will take you to her site and all that eye candy! I was fortunate to receive a handmade ornie from Pat during our TLOFA Christmas ornie swap this past year and it was the perfect little stocking with faux fur and chenille canes.....I still have it up on my year-round tree in our den. So go peek at what she has to offer- you won't be disappointed! :0)

This spring pinkeep/cupboard tuck is what I am donating for the PFATT Spring giveaway. You will need to click ~HERE~ to go to the PFATT blog to sign up and see what else is being donated. Hurry it only lasts from May 1st~May 7th. :0) I added the ladybug in remembrance of our dear PFATT sister Penny McAllister who lost her battle with Leukemia barely a month ago. I didn't get to join in on the balloon release for her birthday- both kids woke up with fevers that morning and wouldn't you know after a trip to our little clinic- they both had strep. Eeew! So glad they didn't share the bug with me!

I had to share some more things I have been getting done and a few lucky finds....

This black cabinet I got at Michaels when we made a quick trip to Cheyenne a few weeks ago. I had a 50% coupon and only paid $19 for it. I painted it plain black and distressed and stained the heck out of it. I love it! This was the only one they had that day- otherwise I would have bought two.....I had another spare 50% coupon and sent Craig through first to pay for the cabinet and I went into the other line to check out with the rest of my loot and the other coupon. Hey, if I'm gonna save money on something, might as well make it a family affair! LOL.

I bought this wood flag probably about 5 years ago out of a Terrys Village catalog. It hung outside every year and I finally decided it was looking pretty sad and faded so I gave it a new paint job- voila! Now it looks so good I don't want to put it back out there, so I think I'll enjoy it inside for a bit. :0)

I had been looking for one of these wall mount flag holders for a long time and had come to the conclusion that nobody carried them anymore. Then by chance I found the Primitives Fore Ewe website and they have them! Oh happy day! I've had it for nearly a month now and just got it up the other day. Whatcha think?

Sage won't let me take her paper "snowflake" down even though spring is (hopefully) just around the corner. Goofy kid! I hate our front door or should I say "doors". Both doors are functional and can open as french doors if you are moving a big piece of furniture in, etc but since the one on the right is always locked in place and we use the other to come and go I consider it to be part of the wall. lol.

Now I have to share my ReStore finds....

Last month I was with my mom at the Habitat for Humanity Restore looking for a replacement exterior door for her house. While 90% of the store is donated building materials, there are other household goods that are donated...I found this lamp for $3- can you believe it? It doesn't have a shade, but I'll get one for it-an easy fix for a bargain. Then in another section of the store they had some porch posts....lots of them.

I nabbed this one...can you believe it was only $30? These are normally about $100. It was the chunkiest of them all. In my pic it doesn't look like it, but it is indeed very thick- 6"x 6" square and 8 feet tall. Most porch posts are more on the "spindley" side. Ever since I had seen one in Country Sampler a few years ago, I have always wanted one to prim up and put an old birdhouse on top since we have vaulted ceilings. Another thing to add to my list of "to-dos"...lol. :0)

Well, I should scoot and get some things done. We are going to visit my dad in Riverton this weekend so I have some last minute packing to finish. Later! ~Jody

Wonderful surprises in the mail!!

Believe it or not, the post office has been my favorite place lately. LOL. Seriously!
First off, I won one of Sandy's giveaways on her blog~ The Olde Country Cupboard and was lucky enough to get this wonderful black doll! I just LOVE her and my picture does not do her justice- she is so prim in person and fits in great with everything else! She is my first black doll and I just love her to pieces!!
Sandy also threw in 6 packages of her soy wax tarts. (there are only 5 pictured cuz I already had some in my warmer...hee hee...) I could smell them even before I got the box open and they are wonderful. Thank you so much Sandy for having such a great giveaway and being soooo generous with your goodies!! :0)

I participated in all the ornie swaps we had in my ebay groups. The first was our PLOA ornie swap and I was the lucky recipient of one of Chris's (theantiquepallet) painted books! It is sooo gorgeous! I have it on top if my pie safe and it may stay there for a while! :0) You can't really see in the pic, but glass glitter is all over the front and it has the most beautiful sparkle. Thank you Chris! I treasure all the wonderful things you've made me!

Next was our PFATT swap. Aren't these ornies beautiful? The cross-stitch Santa is from Kathy~Kathy's Prims, the Green Cone ornie is from Nancy~Nancy Malay, The Angel painting is from Karen~Lovella Ranch, and the little matchbox ornie is from Zinnia~Zinnia's Art. I put them on my 4 foot tree I have specifically for my swap ornies and they look great with all the others from swaps past....

I did also get my ornies from my TLOFA swap, but we have to wait for everyone to get their box before we post pics so we don't ruin the surprise. We make an ornie for each person in the swap, then when we get our box back, we get an ornie from each person, too. It was a great turnout and I got some really wonderful ornies! Hopefully in the next few days I can share some more pics with you. :0) I might also have a few more Christmas pics, too.

Lots and lots to share!

First off, I owe a long overdue thank you to Pea for this lovely award. I have only just recently 'met' Pea and she is truly one of the nicest and friendliest people one can meet! Be sure to check out her blog! She awarded me last week and I had intended to post earlier in the week and, well, as you can see life happened and here I am on Friday already! LOL. Boy, it has been one busy week for us. We left over the weekend and got our (enormous) Christmas tree, then Sage came down sick again on Tuesday and missed some preschool this week. She was pretty wiped out and I was ready to take her to the ped's today, but she is acting a whole lot better, so now we are on the mend and hopefully Chad doesn't catch any of it....boy, when she coughed, she sounded like a barking seal which made me think of croup. (Been there, done that with Chad as an infant) When Craig's sister was little she would get sick and have the same cough. They kept diagnosing it as croup, but later found out she actually had asthma, so that is always in the back of our minds. Luckily (knock on wood) Sage has never had any breathing problems, thus far....
We had an ornie exchange in PLOA and lookie what I got!! They were from Colleen of Colleenscraftshed. The angel ornie on top was for me and she was such a dear to think of my kids and also sent the two snowman "pops" for Sage and Chad! They were so excited to see that they also got something in the box- she also send some little chocolates and that was a big hit, too. Thanks Colleen!

And lookie at my loot from our PFATT ornie swap! We each made four ornies to exchange and that meant we each got four ornies back! Woohoo! Going clockwise from the top: the gingerbread is from Robin of Outside the Box Primitives, the prim hangtag, mini chenille canes and raggedy head ornie are from Arlene- Sweet Things by Arlene, the frog-cicle is from P.K. Gracia of Soft in the Head, and the wool bird and the beautiful cone ornie are from Jo Ellen of Lacey Jane Primitives. The beautiful Santa card in the center reads "PFATT Ornie swap 2008" and was made by Lori of Vintage Palette as a thank you for all of us that participated. We are actually the ones that should be thanking her- she offered to host the swap this year and if it weren't for her, it wouldn't have been possible- thank you Nana for all that you do for us!!

I was also going to share some more Christmas decor pics, but I feel like I have been long winded enough for one post, so maybe I can save those for later. Anyhow, with all that has been going on, we only just decorated our tree the other day and we still have a few things to do to it still.